I live in Vancouver, which is in Canada but not typically Canadian in many ways, the most disgraceful of which is our complete inability to function in the presence of even a tiny bit of snow. It doesn’t snow much here – some years, it doesn’t snow at all. I can’t remember my last snowy Christmas. We do not have the infrastructure to support this kind of weather, and so a couple of centimeters of snow on the streets sends us into turmoil.

It snowed today. I worked from home.

We are planning our next adventure, and we’ve booked our flights – we’ll be in the Netherlands in late January. I am working on a new book, Dutch Feast, and it will be in bookstores and online in fall 2017, and the thing about Dutch food that is so lovely is that a lot of it is sugary carbs. And so even though it’s cold outside and my toes have yet to defrost from this morning’s failed attempt at finding a bus to work, I’m eating Dutch sweets and my home smells like speculaas spices. I mean, it’s an absolute disaster because recipe testing is messy and I’m usually remiss in cleaning up, but it smells nice and if I don’t look in the kitchen this whole scene is pretty cozy.

Yesterday was Guru Nanak’s birthday, which my friend Swarni told me about at work because she thought I’d like to take the kidlet and maybe Nick to visit a gurdwara, donate a dollar, and eat an Indian meal. This is a thing anyone can do, and Swarni says we can bring Tupperware for leftovers but the idea of being the greedy white lady with the Tupperwares mooching food from the Sikh temple kitchen is mortifying. She thinks I’m silly.

It was a quiet day at the office, and so we took a couple of extra coffee breaks and Swarni talked about her late father, and about her faith, which is a weird thing to discuss at the office but if you can get over things being weird and just listen, you can learn stuff. Anything you can learn without Google will make you better, I think, and if not better then at least a little wiser.

I want to learn everything, and am starting to understand how much less I have to talk to do that.

And so we talked, and we ate most of a box of Toffifee that Seti brought in, and then Swarni finally shared her recipe for pork and cabbage, a thing I’ve been begging her for but which she repeatedly waved me off about.

“It’s not much of anything,” she’d say. “My dad always made it, and he invented it.”

“Put it in your cookbook,” she said.

It’s not much of anything, and that’s why it’s so amazing. It’s just a few simple ingredients, and they’re cheap, and it doesn’t cook long, it’s got a depth of flavour you don’t always get in easy weeknight dishes. This one’s a keeper.

She said I could share the recipe with you. She says you can make it with chicken instead of pork, or with mushrooms and peas instead of cabbage, or with a can of puréed spinach. She says it’s best with bone-in pork chops, so you can pluck the bones out of the pot at the end of the meal for a nibble. I haven’t tried those other ways, but we do what Swarni says if we know what’s good for us.

I made this with the intent to pack the leftovers for lunches, and there were no leftovers. The little one gobbled his up, and Nick had two big helpings. I served it with brown rice, but white rice will do just fine. I was going to make raita, but got lazy. A few slices of apple made a perfect accompaniment.

Swarni’s pork and cabbage

(Makes 4 servings.)

3 tbsp. butter

1 onion, trimmed, halved lengthwise, and sliced

1 tsp. coarse salt

4 garlic cloves

1 heaping tablespoon minced fresh ginger

2 tbsp. tomato paste (look for a low- or no-sodium version)

2 tsp. Madras (yellow) curry powder

1/2 tsp. ground black pepper

1 lb. pork tenderloin, cubed

1/2 tsp. garam masala

1 lb. savoy cabbage, cored and thinly sliced

Cilantro

Add butter, onion and salt to a Dutch oven or other heavy pot and sauté over medium-high heat until onions have just begun to soften, about two minutes. Add garlic and ginger, cook for another minute, then add tomato paste and curry powder. Add half a cup of water. Stir to combine.

Add the pork to the pot, and stir to coat the pork in the spice-tomato mixture. Reduce heat to medium, cover the pot, and cook for 15 minutes.

Remove the lid, and add the garam masala. Cook for an additional two minutes.

Add the cabbage, stirring to coat in the sauce mixture until just wilted, another three or four minutes. You don’t want the cabbage to be limp and mushy – it should retain some of its toothiness and crunch.

Sprinkle with a handful of chopped fresh cilantro, and serve over rice.

It’s Thanksgiving tomorrow in Canada, which is as good a time as any for us to talk about cranberries. Though maybe it’s better to talk about empanadas, which are eternal and not bound to a single holiday or feast. Maybe the perfect Thanksgiving is a tropical one, because although today my body is here, in grey old Vancouver, covered in layers of Lycra-cotton blends and fuzzy fleece, my mind is somewhere else: under a palm tree, caftan-clad, and a little rum-drunk beside a plate of freshly fried sweet and savoury pastries.

When you can’t reconcile where you are with where you want to be, the kitchen (and just the right amount of rum) can transport you.

In Aruba, there was a bakery and if you got there early enough, you could buy still-warm pastechis filled with savoury bits of chicken or beef or pork. Pastechis are a Caribbean pastry filled with meats and cheeses, and we saw all types of them throughout our visit to the island; small, crisp pastechis filled with Gouda cheese with thin, crackly pastry like fried wontons, or bigger, chewier pastries reminiscent of empanadas, sweet and sort of like Pizza Pockets but not gross. The bakery was a bit inland, and we asked a lot of Google Maps in navigating us there (what we saved in buying pastries instead of restaurant meals we more than made up for in data and roaming charges), but it was worth it for those pastries which were so unlike anything we’d had before.

I have since done a bit of research, and the difference between pastechis and Caribbean empanadas seems to be corn: pastechi dough is flour-based, and empanada dough uses cornmeal. Both are fried, which is wonderful. Even if I am wrong, either way you can’t lose.

What follows is a recipe for empanadas, even though it’s inspired by the pastechis we ate in Aruba. I like the addition of cornmeal in these as it creates a chewier, sweeter exterior that works will with a tart, jammy filling. Using cranberries brings these home to cold climates and rainy weather and will certainly help take you where you need to go, even if only in your mind.

In a small saucepan over medium-high heat, cook cranberries and persimmons with 1/2-cup of sugar until cranberries have burst and the mixture has become jammy, 10 to 12 minutes, stirring frequently. Set aside and let cool.

Meanwhile, bring a pot with one cup of water and the milk plus three tablespoons of sugar to a boil over medium-high heat. Whisk cornmeal in and cook until thickened, one or two minutes. Add salt and nutmeg, then remove from heat.

Gently fold one cup of flour into the cornmeal mixture until a dough forms. Cover and let rest ten minutes, or until cool enough to handle. Use the remaining flour (about a tablespoon at a time, as needed) to knead your dough for about three minutes, or until it’s no longer sticky.

Divide your dough into eight equal pieces. Roll these into circles about five or six inches in diameter, or to about 1/4-inch thick. Place two to three tablespoons of filling in each, folding the dough over. Press the dough together gently, then seal by pressing the dough down around the fold with the tines of a fork.

Heat oil in a Dutch oven or other sturdy pot to about 350°F. Working in batches, deep-fry empanadas, flipping once to cook both sides, until crisp and golden, about two minutes per side. Drain on a plate lined with paper towel, then serve hot.

My friend Seti says that to “activate” saffron, you grind a little bit of it with a pinch of sugar, then steep it in hot water until the colour deepens. Then you can use the liquid whenever you make rice, or whatever you want to make taste like saffron. She brought me saffron back home with her from Iran, and this is the first saffron that has gone instantly yellow for me, like tiny droplets of yellow food colouring but fragrant. The Trader Joe’s stuff now seems like orange sawdust in a little jar, six dollars for nothing and I’ve got eighteen US dollars’ worth.

It seemed like it was worth a lot more before I knew how well saffron could bloom, and how little of it you’d have to use if you used the good stuff. Everything is fine until you learn there’s something better. Maybe I should have ground the Trader Joe’s stuff down with a bit of sugar. I didn’t know how well that could work.

We’ve finished our first full week of Kindergarten even though I am pretty sure this just happened, but what do I know? On the first day, that just-recently-a-baby and I stopped at Starbucks for hot chocolate on the way in, both of us chattering all the way about the things we’re looking forward to: reading books, writing books, fighting bad guys, flying on planes, and getting big enough for bigger adventures.

I took this week off of work, partly because I wanted to concentrate on a bit of writing in a quiet apartment for once, but mostly because we have yet to sort out the details around Kindergarten drop-off and pick-up, and because the teachers ease the kids into school, gradually increasing the number of hours they’re in the classroom until they get to a full day, even the daycare kids for whom “full days” have always meant days longer than our work-days. “Gradual entry should be optional!” I exclaim to everyone but also no one in particular. I am talking to myself.

So I’ve been walking two little boys to Kindergarten, mine and his friend who are a month apart in age and who is like a cousin or brother because they’ve been together, always for long days, since they were barely sentient. We cut through a park and on the way we stop at a pond and look at the ducks, and then they pick things up off the ground that I ask them not to, and then I shout at them for throwing things at the ducks.

I listen to the other moms with their sweet, calm voices around their children who are surely as infuriating as mine is, as I think most children can be, and I practice their tones but when I do it, it always comes off a little condescending. In the yellow light that tints these fall mornings, both kids sort of glow, their fair hair almost ginger, the bright colours of their little boy clothes somehow over-saturated. I try not to talk too much.

“Stop throwing crap at the ducks!” I have already come down with a cold.

To make saffron milk, take a pinch of saffron, just what you can grab with the tips of your thumb and forefinger, and grind it into your palm with the thumb of your other hand until the strands crumble into little pieces. Good saffron has a smell a little bit like sweet pepper, and reminds me a bit of anise, not because of its fragrance but because of the way both are sweet and bitter at the same time.

Saffron milk is an old-fashioned Dutch cold remedy, though the Dutch had trading posts in India for over 200 years so it’s likely that merchants there were influenced by Ayurveda and the medicinal use of saffron milk to improve sleep, reduce inflammation, and to strengthen the baby’s heart during pregnancy.

Dutch mothers are said to be patient people. I like the idea that someone has figured out parenting and is doing it right, somewhere. It makes me feel like anyone could do it.

Add your bits of saffron to a saucepan with a cup and a half or so of milk, and about a teaspoon of honey. Natural health proponents suggest drinking warm milk and honey as a sleep aid, as both are sources of tryptophan. What science says about this is kind of a downer, of course, but there is something soothing about a warm mug in your hands nevertheless.

Bring the milk to a boil over medium heat, whisking quickly for maximum frothiness. Remove the pot from the heat, and pour the whole thing into a mug or two teacups. It makes about twelve ounces, or the amount of a tall Starbucks latte. This is enough for one or two people.

When you sip your saffron milk, do so with your eyes closed. Think about little golden boys, and the way they shine now, the way they are like sunflowers stretching toward the yellow morning light. Do not think about those blue shadows stretching out behind them, where you stand, fretting, worrying about the time. They call out to the ducks, and the ducks swim away faster as their voices rise to be heard.

I have been kind of obsessed with General Tso’s Chicken since last spring, when I sat in my dark living room and watched The Search for General Tso on Netflix, and on an empty stomach. I think General Tso’s is the kind of thing that is a phenomenon in the US; in Canada we have our own interpretation of “Chinese food” – did you know that Ginger Beef was invented in Calgary, Alberta? Anyway, it looked delicious and I needed to get into it right away. I wish I could see people doing yoga and react with the same sense of urgency.

General Tso’s Chicken is not served at dim sum, which is how we most often enjoy Chinese cuisine, and though it appears on the occasional take-out menu, it’s never in the combos (we’re a Dinner for 2 B family, with its chicken chow mein and red saucy sweet-and-sour pork). For too long, there was no opportune time to get to know the General. No time, that is, until this past Saturday.

Thanks to Food Bloggers of Canada and Clarkson Potter, I was offered the opportunity to review a copy of food writer Kian Lam Kho‘s cookbook, Phoenix Claws and Jade Trees. In order to fulfill my part of the deal, I was tasked with preparing a dinner with a few of the dishes from the book. To get a sense of the variety of recipes, I read the whole thing in a single evening, shouting excitedly at Nick about all the wonderful things we would get to have once he cleaned the kitchen and figured out how to get me eight pounds of nontoxic pottery clay (Beggar’s Chicken, page 314).

This book is beautiful. The writing is clear and well-paced; the photos are stunning and often demonstrate multiple steps in a single collage. Everything about it says “cooking Chinese cuisine unlike anything you’ve seen on a North American take-away menu is easy and fun and you should do it right now. Right now!” And while I can’t speak to the ease of obtaining the ingredients just anywhere, in Vancouver it was only as challenging as deciding which T&T to go to (Renfrew & 1st Avenue won out – free parking).

Within an hour, I had gathered all of the ingredients to prepare six recipes from the book for a Mid-Autumn Festival feast for three friends. The ingredients were very affordable. I think I spent $53 on the entire meal (including a very cheap and sort of embarrassing rosé), and we had leftovers for two days.

There were so many intriguing dishes in this book, and a good mix of challenging dishes to prepare when you’ve got the time and quick, straightforward recipes you could make on a weeknight or for company.

The best thing about this book, at least for me, is that most of the recipes are designed to make two servings: this way, I can make enough for Nick and I for a weekend lunch or weeknight dinner, or make a dinner party of multiple dishes without going overboard on quantity. I also love that so many of the dishes are so inexpensive to make; the Mapo Tofu, for example, called for a quarter-pound of ground beef and two dollars’ worth of tofu.

Once you build a pantry of some of the book’s more frequently used ingredients, you can make the recipes quickly and cheaply. I’ve already used the Szechuan chili paste from the Mapo Tofu twice more since Saturday. It brings boring old steamed broccoli or scrambled eggs to LIFE.

My dinner guests were split on their favourites – one liked the Red Cooked Lion’s Head: “I’ve never had this dish before,” she said, “but the flavour reminds me of something similar I might have eaten as a child.” Another was quite keen on the black vinegar and garlic dressing, which I’ll agree is incredible, especially for how simple it is.

I fell in love with the Mapo Tofu, a dish I have been fond of for my whole life in Vancouver – this version was so simple, but so perfectly spicy and salty and balanced. And General Tso’s Chicken? It’s not too sweet, with a lot of garlic and a little bit of vinegar and heat: in short, it’s everything I hoped it would be.

General Tso’s Chicken

Makes two servings.

Marinade

2 tbsp. Shaoxing cooking wine

1 large egg white

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. ground white pepper

1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 3/4-inch cubes

Sauce

3/4 cup chicken stock or water

1/4 cup Shaoxing cooking wine

2 tbsp. Chinkiang black vinegar

1 tbsp. soy sauce

1 tsp. hoisin sauce

2 tbsp. tapioca starch

1 tbsp. sugar

4 cups vegetable oil

3/4 cup tapioca starch

3 tbsp. minced garlic

1 tbsp. minced fresh ginger

1/4 cup dried red chilies

1 tbsp. roasted sesame oil

1 tsp. sesame seeds, toasted

2 tbsp. thinly sliced scallion greens

In a medium bowl, whisk together marinade ingredients. Add the chicken cubes, and, using your hands, work the marinade into the meat so that all pieces are well-coated. Set aside for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, mix sauce ingredients together in another bowl. Set this aside too.

Put the tapioca starch into a bowl.

In a wok or Dutch oven, heat the vegetable oil to 375°F, or until it shimmers. Dredge the chicken pieces through the tapioca starch until well-coated. Working in batches, fry chicken pieces in the hot oil until golden brown, four to five minutes. Remove chicken with a slotted spoon to a plate lined with paper towels.

Pour off all but two tablespoons of the cooking oil, then return your wok or pot to the stove and add the garlic and ginger, cooking for about 30 seconds; do not let these burn. Add the chilies and cook for another 30 seconds. Give the sauce mixture a quick stir, then add this to the wok or pot and cook for about a minute, until the sauce has thickened. Return the chicken to the wok or pot and toss the pieces in the sauce. Add the sesame oil, then toss again.

Garnish with sesame seeds and scallions. Serve with rice and a cold salad.

The giveaway

To win a copy of Phoenix Claws and Jade Trees from Clarkson Potter, leave a comment below describing your favourite Chinese dish. You can leave comments until 11:59 PST on October 2; on October 3, I’ll put all the names in a hat and draw a winner. The winner will be notified by email on October 3.

Please note that this giveaway is for Canadian readers only; watch redcook.net after September 14 for information on giveaways for American readers.

Disclosure: I received a copy of this book for free. However, I really like the book and would buy it for myself if it wasn’t offered to me first. No one pays me money for my opinions, which is probably for the best.

We took a break this summer, from almost everything. I’ve been plugging away at a proposal for my next project, and it’s mostly done (except for all the second-guessing and self-doubt and despair); the rest was just reading and cooking and working on some new recipes. And though we couldn’t/still can’t really afford it, we escaped for a couple of weeks to Aruba to give the kidlet a vacation and do a bit of culinary research.

It might be the best thing we’ve ever done, because it might have been the most necessary thing we’ve ever done. The brain needs breaks, stretches of passivity where it just takes stuff in and doesn’t critique or react. I have spent so long critiquing and reacting, managing the busyness of just being an adult in 2016. I know that we are not supposed to talk about being busy, because busyness is a sign that we’ve failed to set our priorities or manage our time or some fixable thing, but I am in that stage of life where this is how it is. And so we wandered around Aruba, tanning our skin, filling our bellies, and resting our brains.

Now, I am no expert, having only been once to Aruba and only recently. But I have fielded enough questions about this wonderful place that I thought perhaps you might be interested in what we did and ate and saw. With a grain of salt, as always, here is my perspective.

Where we stayed

We stayed in Noord, in the Del Ray Apartments, which was just far enough from the stretch of tower hotels around Palm Beach and the port at Oranjestad – it was quiet, there were grocery stores and locally owned restaurants nearby, and it was dark at night with no noisy tourists outside. The best thing about Aruba is the wind: it is very windy, so that there is not very much noise. If your hair is like mine, it will look just awful all of the time, but if I’m being honest it never looks all that great anyway. The wind is nice. It cools when it’s very hot, and it’s consistently very hot there as it is pretty much a desert. There are cacti.

We wanted something with a kitchenette to cook breakfast or fry croquettes, and some privacy so that we’d have evenings to ourselves once the little one was in bed, and it was perfect for us. There was a pool, and it was clean, and the people who worked there were nice, even arranging a rental car for us when we decided it was time to drive off and explore. Renting a car was inexpensive. We were the only Canadians, and there were no Americans – lots of Spanish-speaking South American and Dutch-speaking European families. In short, it was nice to meet people from new places and try to plow through the language barrier to find out what they were planning to eat, see and do on the island.

There are all-inclusive hotels, if you prefer that sort of vacation, but the island is safe and small enough that you can explore most of it in not too long and you should. There’s so much more to it than just the hotel strips (and the food is much better away from there anyway).

What we ate

My favourite thing to do anyplace is go to the local supermarket and buy everything interesting or different, and so we did that. Aruba is part of the set of islands that comprise the Dutch Caribbean, and so there were wonderful Dutch cheeses and meats to select from the deli, and croquettes and bitterballen in an astonishing variety of flavours from the freezer section. They had European yogurts, American junk food, Indonesian spices, South American produce and the freshest, most wonderful local seafood. Aruba itself doesn’t have much of an agriculture industry (again, desert), but the seafood is impeccable. If you can stay somewhere with a barbecue, pick up some of their big fat shrimp and grill them whole; marinate a red onion in a bit of vinegar to serve alongside and you’ll never eat better.

The fish counter at Super Food Plaza in Noord offered freshly fried local fish and cold Balashi beer – do not pass that up. Zeerovers in Savaneta was another favourite – buy your seafood by the pound, order every side dish, and feed your shrimp shells to the gulls and the fish in the water below the pier.

Some of the highlights were a mix of Dutch favourites and local specialties; one thing I can’t stop thinking of was the keeshi yena we ordered at The Old Cunucu House. Keeshi yena is a local creole dish of chicken stuffed cheese. The chicken is stewed with spices, capers, dried fruit, and cashews, then spooned into a dish lined with strips of Gouda, then covered and baked until the cheese is melty.

We visited Bright Bakery a few times for pastechis (a local, empanada-like pastry), fish croquettes, and sweets. My favourite pastechi was the “chop soy” version filled with cabbage, onions, and shredded chicken. The cheese balls – actual deep fried balls of cheese – were magical, and the macaroons were heaps of toasted coconut in a puddle of brown sugar, butter and cinnamon.

We were driving one day and smelled Fermins BBQ from the car – we followed our noses were not disappointed. The prices were good, the chicken was smoky and delicious, and the ribs were excellent. More cold beer. Endless cold beer.

For the little one, Linda’s Dutch Pancakes & Pizzas was perfect – I don’t want to admit to how many chocolate-covered pannekoeken he ate; the sandwiches made a cheap, filling lunch.

Restaurant Indo offered Indo-Surinamese cuisine, with a particularly impressive rijsttafel, a Dutch feast via Indonesia where many small dishes are served with rice and condiments. Order the rijsttafel and add chicken liver sambal – it’s small, so get two if there’s more than a couple of you dining. Even if it seems like a lot of food, don’t miss out on bara, savoury Surinamese doughnuts made with split black lentils and Indian spices and served with chutney.

There are innumerable Chinese restaurants that also happen to be bars – it would have been a very different trip if we were child-free, so if you’re curious, don’t hesitate to stop in. We visited one and were delighted to find our food came with a bottle of mayonnaise (probably for the Dutch). Nick ordered roast chicken, and it came with what we thought was gravy but actually turned out to be a warm, thin peanut sauce that was surprising and hard to stop dipping my finger into. We might have preferred to stick around for rum drinks afterward, but travelling with a four-year-old is not conducive to enjoying cocktails late into the night.

If you’re driving, there are loads of little snack stands – they sell a range of things, from sandwiches and pastries to fruit smoothies and cold drinks, but they’re worth checking out if you’re thinking you’d like a bite to eat and want to avoid the usual fast food chains.

What we loved

Arashi beach. Spotting herds of wild goats just, like, chilling wherever. Feeding one particularly obstinate donkey at the donkey sanctuary. Feeding the Shetland pony at Philip’s Animal Garden. Feeding the fish at Zeerovers. Icy rum and tonics on the balcony at our hotel after an early purple sunset. Iguanas! Eavesdropping on American conversations at Palm Beach, where we pretended we were guests of the Holiday Inn so we could use their deck chairs and towels and order buckets of Balashi to where we sat. The colourful houses, especially in Savaneta and San Nicolas. Frozen blue cocktails. The platter of Dutch deep-fried snacks at The Paddock in Oranjestad our first afternoon in Aruba.

Aruba offered us a reasonably priced getaway (summer is off-season for the island), and a trip that was family friendly, totally relaxing, and exactly what we needed. If you go, let me know – I’ll insist you pick me up a couple of boxes of hagelslag and some fancy aloe vera.

If you like ratatouille, I think you’ll be into this. It’s got all that deep tomato flavour, but with a touch of smoke and a bit more texture, thanks to the tempeh, and the flavours are sweet and sour and spicy all at once. It also comes together in about half an hour, so it is in many ways a perfect cloudy summer day dish, nourishing and flavourful but not a huge pain in the ass to pull together on a weeknight.

Tempeh is a fermented soy product that originated in Indonesia, where it’s very popular in Bali – the soybeans are bound together by a mold that sort of resembles the white rind on a wheel of brie. It’s a living food that’s very high in protein and fibre, and it’s got a mild flavour and firm texture that has allowed me to pass it off as chicken nuggets to some of our less discerning family members. Tempeh is often found near the tofu in the market; if you can’t find it, you can use extra firm tofu.

If you’re in Vancouver, check out Tempea Foods tempeh, which is made locally and often available at the Vancouver Farmer’s Markets. I am in love with this product (I don’t get paid to say that, so it’s earnest).

For the recipe that follows, if you’re not able to find tamarind paste, use cooking molasses. If you’re not able to find lime leaves, use the zest and juice of an additional lime. Look for fresh lime leaves in Asian grocery stores or in the Asian ingredients section of your market’s produce section; you can often find dried or frozen lime leaves in Asian markets as well.

Heat one tablespoon of oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Add the shallots, garlic, ginger, and lemongrass, and cook – stirring occasionally – until browned and slightly charred in places, about three minutes. Pour this mixture into a blender.

Add the pan back to medium-high heat and add another tablespoon of oil.

Cook the tempeh for about two minutes per side, until browned and charred in places. Remove tempeh to a plate lined with paper towel.

Add the final tablespoon of oil to the pan. Cook the eggplant in a manner similar to the tempeh – until browned and charred in bits. Another two minutes.

Add the tomatoes to the pan, and add the tempeh back. Reduce heat to medium. Add the reserved blender mixture. Add salt and pepper. Stir the mixture together and cook – stirring occasionally – until the tomatoes and eggplant have expressed most of their liquid and the sauce has thickened, another 10 to 12 minutes. The mixture should resemble a chunky tomato sauce.

Stir cashews into the pan, and then sprinkle with scallions. Serve over rice.